I’ve been wondering if I want to continue writing or take a break or give it up altogether.

I know why I started my Golly Molly Aiyoh. It ticked one of the three boxes that I had read somewhere that people ‘needed’ in life. The box it ticked was ‘something to do.’ The other two were ‘someone to love’ and ‘something to look forward to.’

My ‘something to do’ overlaps with my ‘something to look forward to.’ Two boxes ticked. Gratefully, I can also tick the ‘someone to love’ box, and an extra box for the ‘to be loved right back’ box. Yay!

I like to write. I like to think about what to write. I like to read about the stuff I write or plan to write about. It gives me purpose, and the process is mostly fun. Especially, as I don’t have an editor breathing down my neck or an irrevocable deadline looming. I start with a topic in mind and end up with one that I don’t even recognise myself😊. Totally unrelated but who cares.

The ‘something to do’ each week melds with my ‘something to look forward to’ when I post what I’ve managed to cobble together, in the hope that the end product makes some sense. The topics I choose are personal – people, feelings, happenings – closely related to me. And, observations that interest, irk and affect me.  An almost ‘syiok sendiri’ endeavour as some Malaysians would say. It is ‘syiok sendiri’ in a sense, as I don’t write for likes or clicks or comments. I write for me.

That said, I’m not sure how I feel about comments and feedback. It’s not not-nice to get feedback, the one or two (no exaggeration) that I receive weekly. And, I appreciate that my less than minuscule community of readers, comprising very low double-digit members of my family and friends, who very kindly subscribed via email, make time to read the stuff I write. Sincerely, I appreciate the effort.

Particularly when there is a deluge of audio and visual content fighting for everyone’s headspace. I don’t read a lot of things that I receive online. I edit. I read the headline, and decide whether reading a part or the whole story would enlighten or make a meaningful difference to me. Most times, I delete.

Back to what to do with my blog. To date, I’ve posted 402 stories. That’s a lot of stories made up since I started in August 2018. I still enjoy writing although sometimes it’s hard to think of what to write. I mean there’s only so much I can write with slightly different takes about most of the same-old, same-old things that happen in a year. Like travels and holidays, events, memories, and moans like potholes that don’t get mended and grow into larger and more dangerous cavities😊.

I’m wondering if I should write some other stuff as there’s so much upside-downness in the world we live in. I don’t know… maybe there was always upside-downness at different times in life but I feel it more now. Without wanting to sound trite, it feels like being in the somewhat parallel alternate dimension called the ‘The Upside Down’ in Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things.’ Only much worse as its real and happening in this world.  

My husband and I watched all five seasons of ‘Stranger Things’ continuously over three weeks. Yes, seriously. We had forgotten most of the scenes and storyline, so it was a good recap. Monsters like the Demogorgon, Mind Flayer and Vecna – predatory, menacing looking creatures that cause major menace, reminded me of real-life vile monsters that have lurked and are still lurking in the real world. Thankfully, the series ended on a somewhat happy ending.

I was wondering about the typical, galvanizing factors that turn people-into-monsters such as greed, power, more greed, control, domination, destruction, supremacy, might, wealth, and authority. Maybe not always … but it’s evident that people with power, and those in stratospheric places control/sway the very powers-that-be of a country’s executive, judiciary and legislative.

People, once voted into power, become heads of states or so-called leaders, merrily forget that they were once voters themselves. They casually forget promises made and cannot remember what is morally right and legally correct.

People with might overrule rules with impunity. There is a coterie of people with too much wealth who run rough short over the not necessarily the have-nots (which is a given, sadly) but the have-just-a-little-less than them. Money talks, walks, and corrupts. In some instances, these very people wield their power to ruthlessly subjugate their own and other people if they do not agree and conform to decrees by them. ‘The strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must[1].’  

I’m wondering if writing stuff or anything makes any difference to the upside-downness.